In fact, there was only one series that ever truly encompassed me - The Infinity Gauntlet. At the time, this series had just about as big of a hype you could possibly imagine a comic book getting. The buzz was unbelievable. Even the bigwig Marvel comic books had crossovers into it.

But what was it that made it so magical, least in my view? Well first of all...this wasn't just a little comic book series. The stakes were much higher. The entire Marvel Universe's fate was to be decided. Just about every hero was fighting for their own reality. And it had the villain to end all villains - Thanos.

Thanos will forever be the ultimate king of cool. Here's a guy who went out and killed off some of the lamer comic legends to attain the Infinity Gems, which are kinda like what that girl from No Doubt sometimes wears on her forehead, only they had special powers. There were five of them, and whomever got a hold of them all would essentially become 'God'. Religious blasphemy aside, the idea was beautiful. Thanos was obsessed with death, who conviently had a true-life form named, you guessed it, Death. To attain her love, silly Thanos felt he had to shift the cosmic balance by killing off half the universe and building weird shrines. After people started dissapearing, and after an emotionally wrought Silver Surfer ruined a perfectly good window in Doctor Strange's house, a team was assembled to overtake Thanos.

But that's the best part - not only did they fail, they failed miserably. Here you had all the so-called super powers on one side going against ONE guy, and they couldn't get the job done. So what happens next? All the glorious universal deities team up against Thanos, and they fail too!

In fact, Thanos would never have been defeated if his tragic flaw of doubt didn't kick in. As was the case with the Cosmic Cube, Thanos subconsciously planted the seeds to his defeat, allowing his charred granddaughter, Nebula, to seize the Gauntlet. (the Gauntlet, by the way, was Thanos' glove encrusted with the five Infinity gems)

After some more chicanery, Thanos actually teamed up with the heroes and ended the war. Thanos didn't really go 'good guy', but at the same time, he proved there was more to him than evil. Plus, at the end of the series after Adam Warlock, a guy who looked like a cross between He-Man and the WWF's Goldust, seized the Gauntlet, Thanos 'retired' to some farm on an off-world planet, and we get a neat glimpse of him wearing a robe without his helmet.

That's the basic plot. I'm leaving out the fact that Thanos employed some of the most creative uses of murder in comic book history:

Thor: Turned to glass, shattered.
Incredible Hulk: Shrunk to 5" tall, stomped on.
Cyclops: Clear box put over his head, suffocating him.
She-Hulk: Engrossed in this brown fuzzy stuff, suffocated.
Wolverine: Admantium bones turned to rubber.
Quasar: Hands blown off!

And the best one..

Nova: Turned into - get this - little colored blocks. Stepped on.

Classic stuff! Thanos gained credibility with the actor's guild for bringing seriousness to such goofiness. It was absolutely surreal. Thanos would mock everyone around him by messing up their genetics. He removed Eros' mouth, and left Nebula as a severe burn victim as a piece of 'artwork' for Death. Now you know what American Psycho is based on.

The Infinity Gauntlet was revolutionary. It has to be regarded as one of the top three most successful crossover comic book series in history. It's so not fair that the lame Death of Superman got such recognition, as if that one didn't come with a free armband and some fake stamps, I'm sure the Gauntlet would still reign supreme.

Yeah, that fucking Superman comic was great. Stupid main villain crushes a bird in his hand and laughs like a maniac. Yeah, fucking terrific. I hate DC, the only thing they've done right in the past two decades is letting Tim Burton direct their Batman movies...and they even fucked that one up.

Getting back on track....

Unfortunately, just as Sly Stallone didn't know when Rocky needed to quit, either did Marvel editors. Two spinoff series, The Infinity War and The Infinity Crusade spawned from this one. While Infinity War did have a slight charm, the plot oversights were more obvious than those in any given episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. And don't get me started on The Infinity Crusade, which pretty much crushed the whole legend on the entire epic.

That aside, The Infinity Gauntlet remains a cherished member of that rare collection of comic books I actually read. Fans can probably still find it at comic shops, or definitely someplace on the net. I reccomend it *very* highly.